In a Monterey County courtroom, Eva Ruiz-Gomez waits for her case to be heard. Dressed in a blazer and slacks, she squirms in her seat and often leans sideways to whisper to one of her supporters.

A parade of inmates in orange and white jail uniforms await their turn before the judge. Drug addicts and other petty criminals are called before her, people who get pushed through the system, often in less than five minutes.

When her case is called, it takes her attorney about half an hour to argue her case. These are special circumstances, the attorney explains.

Indeed, Ruiz-Gomez's case seems to be more complicated than a typical child custody battle, at least according to "Eva's Army."

Ruiz-Gomez, a 38-year-old woman accused of kidnapping her child, whom she had sole custody of, and taking him to Mexico, has earned the sympathy of dozens of Peninsula residents who call themselves "Eva's Army." They lend their support by appearing with her at court hearings, writing letters on her behalf and helping her raise more than $5,000 to pay for her defense.

On Wednesday, they held a rally to demand her charges be dropped. On Thursday, they were scrambling to get her another attorney.

"Roughly 35 people have donated, purchased items, written letters or helped in a whole variety of other ways," said Helen Rose, trustee for the Eva Ruiz-Gomez Legal Defense Trust.

They believe Ruiz-Gomez is innocent; that the boy's father is manipulating the system to evade child support payments; that Monterey County judges, the district attorney and other law enforcement officials are colluding to snatch her 14-year-old boy away from her; and that a lot of money is being misspent in a case that should have been dismissed long ago.

"How could this Kafkaesque nightmare happen to an innocent woman at this time, in 'progressive' California?" said Rose, a retired Pacific Grove teacher, in an email to The Herald. "I was formerly a completely naive believer in the criminal justice system, so this has been a brutal wake-up call for me."

Ruiz-Gomez's son "is being destroyed by whatever intentions the judge has," said Sylvia Shih, a 71-year-old member of the Monterey Peace and Justice Center. "He's a very happy, intelligent kid, and this fight is not good for him."

Shih, like Rose and others, has been a frequent presence at Ruiz-Gomez's court hearings, which in the past two years have become almost a weekly occurrence. They vow to continue supporting Eva until all charges against her are dropped.

'Never wanted the baby'

Valori George, a well-known activist and founder of the Monterey Peace and Justice Center, met Ruiz-Gomez when she was a little girl.

"She was stunning," George said of the immigrant from Mexico. "She stuck out as someone different and unusual."

George has been part of Ruiz-Gomez's life since. She was there when Ruiz-Gomez became emancipated at 14 so she could work and help support her family. She was there when the young woman was married at 19 and had her first child, and when she fell in love about five years later with Ramón Muñoz, the father of her now-14-year-old son. And George was there when Muñoz kicked her out of the house during her pregnancy.

"The petitioner never wanted the baby and neither did his family," Ruiz-Gomez said about Muñoz in court records. "During the last two months of my pregnancy, the petitioner was continually verbally abusive and physically violent towards me. He was physically violent towards me at least two times."

Friends and court records describe Muñoz as being increasingly violent toward Ruiz-Gomez, though he does not have a domestic violence court record.

On the advice of her attorney, Ruiz-Gomez would not talk to The Herald for this story. Muñoz declined to respond to a long list of questions The Herald sent by email.

Moving to Mexico

After her breakup with Muñoz, Ruiz-Gomez met Ismael Garcia. Her son was a toddler and soon began referring to Garcia as his father, friends say.

Muñoz was still in the picture, at least legally. He sued Ruiz-Gomez to obtain the boy's Social Security number for insurance reasons. What he got instead was an order to pay $380 in child support.

Thus began Ruiz-Gomez's long road through the family and criminal court system.

Ruiz-Gomez, a housekeeper, always dreamed of owning her own bed and breakfast, friends say. With that end in mind, she obtained an order signed by Judge John Phillips allowing her to move to Mexico with her then-3-year-old son at the end of November 2002.

According to court orders, Muñoz would be able to see his son during the Christmas holiday, and Ruiz-Gomez was supposed to bring the boy to Monterey County for a visit at Muñoz's expense.

But preparations for the move to Mexico took longer than expected, so the family postponed the trip.

In February 2003, with Ruiz-Gomez still in Monterey, Phillips issued another order: Muñoz could have visits with his son on alternate weekends. Muñoz, who has a documented history of alcohol abuse, was ordered not to consume alcohol while the boy was in his care. The order also stipulated that Ana Muñoz Hernandez, Muñoz's sister and a sheriff's deputy, supervise the visits.

The months that followed were full of tension between Muñoz and Ruiz-Gomez and revolved around visits for their child. The boy got sick frequently, but Muñoz believed Ruiz-Gomez was making excuses so he couldn't see his son. He even had the Sheriff's Office check on the family to make sure the child was indeed sick.

The family moved to Mexico in October 2003. Ruiz-Gomez and her husband opened a bed and breakfast in San Miguel de Allende while their children attended private schools.

In court records, Ruiz-Gomez says she gave Muñoz her contact information so he could visit their son.

In July 2004, with the family now firmly planted in Mexico, Muñoz attempted to serve Ruiz-Gomez with custody-change papers at her mother's house in Seaside. Ruiz-Gomez's attorney insists the order is not valid because it wasn't served properly. The person who received it was Ruiz-Gomez's younger sister, with whom she has a strained relationship.

It's that order Ruiz-Gomez is accused of violating, on which the criminal charges are based.

Son taken

Life in Mexico went relatively unchanged for Ruiz-Gomez and her family until 2008. Then the economy tanked. Her husband returned to Monterey County and took a job at the Big Sur Lodge. The rest of the family followed, and by fall 2009, her 12-year-old began attending Carmel Middle School.

More than a year had passed when, on Sept. 28, 2010, Ruiz-Gomez received a call from her son's school that he had been taken by police, friends say. Monterey County District Attorney's Office investigator Manuel Infante told her she would have to meet him in Salinas if she wanted her son back.

At the investigator's office, she was told she was under arrest for intention to "deprive custody," a felony.

Ruiz-Gomez — who has dysautonomia, a condition that affects the autonomic nervous system, the one that controls breathing and heart function, among others — went into convulsions, George said.

It took Ruiz-Gomez, who was freed on bail, nearly two weeks to get her son back. Part of her attorney's fight to get all charges dismissed is a claim that her son was illegally taken by representatives with the District Attorney's Office and the Sheriff's Office. The boy was taken without meeting the necessary legal conditions, says attorney Dario Navarro: the mother had full custody of the child, he was not in immediate danger and the family was not a flight risk.

On Oct. 10, 2010, Judge Thomas Wills ordered the child to be returned to his mother immediately.

Refuses plea bargain

For the past two years, Ruiz-Gomez has also battled the Monterey County court system on the family law front, where Muñoz continues to demand reunification sessions with the couple's son — even though the boy refuses. Family friends say the 14-year-old remains traumatized by the 11 days he spent with his father during what they call the "legal kidnapping."

Ruiz-Gomez's illness and frequent court appearances have kept her from working, so she can hardly afford to get an attorney, friends say. Bills are piling up, but she has refused to accept a plea bargain.

That's another element Ruiz-Gomez's friends admire about her — that she has refused to say she is guilty of anything.

Ninety-five percent of convictions in the U.S. legal system are handed down through plea bargains, the result of an overloaded system where finding quick solutions is perceived to be in the best interest of all involved. But it's a system riddled with defects, say some legal scholars. In many cases, it pressures people to take a quick exit, even if they are innocent.

For low-income people, the pressures are even more intense: They can't afford a lawyer or take time off work for frequent trips to the courts.

Dismayed at justice system

Before joining Ruiz-Gomez on her frequent trips to Monterey courts, many of her supporters say they were naive about the legal system. They believed a case could be easily dismissed with the help of a good lawyer, if you proved you were following the rules.

Friends say Ruiz-Gomez has followed the rules: She never hides her son and shows up at all court dates and court-mandated reunification sessions. She provides all the paperwork requested, friends say, and pays her bills.

So far, it hasn't been enough. And with every trip to court, their resentment and distrust of the Monterey County legal system continues to grow.

"If my taxes pay for this justice system, then I want to see justice done," says Mabelle Lernoud, one of Ruiz-Gomez's supporters.

"It was stupid for the district attorney to enforce the abduction of the boy from his classroom," said Carol Erickson, a retired public health nurse who lives in Carmel Valley. "I don't know Muñoz, but anybody who goes after the person who has provided for the child ... is so vindictive. These are things I find deeply disturbing."

Muñoz was recently ordered to pay more than $20,000 in past-due child support. He is fighting to have no penalties imposed. Ruiz-Gomez's supporters believe he has been pushing to get partial custody in order to avoid the payments.

"I resent my taxpayer dollars being spent on a case like this," said Marci Rustad, a former trustee with the Carmel Unified School District. "Why would you even pursue this case? What kind of fairness is there in the system?"